How To Document Your Baby's First Years

As a new mom, one of the main things you want to make sure you do is keep perfect records of your baby’s progress and growth. This can be from your baby’s diaper sizes to when they say their first word to their first day of Kindergarten! This post is about some of the easy ways to document your baby’s first years! Continue reading for my FAVORITE way to track a baby’s progress and memories!

Baby Books/Journal

Baby books are great for guidance. They are already set up with the topics and questions and all you have to do is add the information. So, there’s no trying to remember what you should keep, what you should get a picture of, and so on. You can use the book as a guide for what you need for keepsakes. As baby grows, you will know what you need to write down and what to look for or ask.

I also write a journal each month. I write my baby’s updates like weight, what he’s eating, doctor’s appointments, and what new skill he’s learned. This is actually the most difficult for me because it is difficult to remember to update the journal each month. Once you are behind, you then have to catch up on the previous months. If you are good at remember to journal, then this is an awesome technique. Once your child grows older, they can read all about what life was like with them as a baby, how you felt, and all you did to care for them. This is a really cool way to document memories and really relive them with your child!

Groovebook

Groovebook is a photo printing company that prints photo books for $3!!! Each photo book has 100 photos printed from your phone! When you get your photo book, each photo has the date printed on the side of when that picture was taken! So, all of those memorable moments, take out your phone and document them with a click of a button! You can get a FREE photo book HERE!!!!

Printable Calendar/Planner

From the beginning of my pregnancy, I printed a FREE printable calendar and documented my pregnancy progress. This is how I was able to write my post, “My Super Pregnancy”. I also used the information that I journaled, too. (I wrote a monthly journal during my pregnancy.) This way, I could go to certain months and see what all happened in those months. I can find when AJ sleep through the night, when he first smiled, and so on. Usually, we mark things on calendars to keep track of what’s coming up. Well, I kept a calendar to track how things went. When you look back at it, it’s like flipping through a year of your life! (Or your BABY’s life, I should say!) The trouble with this strategy is, once again, remembering to record info on the calendar, but you can handle that, then this is a really neat way to document your baby’s progress and memories!

Apps

Apps have made so many things easier for me. Even tracking my baby’s progress and documenting memorable moments! There are THREE apps that I love and perfect for tracking your baby’s growth and development!

Baby Day Book

I started using this app right after AJ was born. It helped me keep track of his feedings, sleeping habits, and diaper changes. The hospital gave me printed daily recording sheets to document AJ’s feedings, diaper changes, and sleep times, but after a while, I needed a quick way to get that done. Baby Day Book came to the rescue. I used this app until AJ got into a routine and I had learned his patterns. This is a great app to really keep track of your baby’s physical development like weight and height because you can also see where your baby is as far as percentile right at your fingertips! You can also track meals and look back at what all your baby liked to eat and what they especially enjoyed!

Baby Center “My Baby”

This app is basically Baby Center at your fingertips! You can read about what’s coming up in your baby’s development based on their age, make a checklist of this to do and try with your baby, have easy access to articles about feedings and sleep, plus you have a tab for the forum! So you can pull out your phone and with a click, have a discussion with other moms dealing with the same things you are at that very moment! This app has helped me, not so much record AJ’s progress, but keep up with where he should be physically, cognitively, and behaviorally. It gives tips for things that apply to your baby at the very age they are. It also reminds you of certain photos to take! (Take a photo of baby eating his first chopped fruit!!!)

Tinybeans

This app is by far my FAVORITE app!!! As far as keeping up with baby milestones, progress, and memories, THIS APP HAS IT ALL!!!!! You can save photos everyday and keep track of memories and when they happened! When you upload photos, it adds them to a calendar that you can scroll through and basically watch your baby grow before your eyes!!!! You can also add notes like “said first word ‘Mama’!” on the calendar! And that’s not all! This app gives you milestones that your baby should be able to meet within the different age ranges, and you tap to add that milestone to the calendar to show that your baby has met that milestone! Easy as that! Now you can look back and see photos of what baby was doing when he or she said their first word and see what the word was!

You can also add video of all of those happy moments! The milestone lists goes from cognitive to communication to motor skills development! There are even reading milestones! You can see what to expect in each age group and work with your baby to meet those milestones. Plus, take pictures and video to have it all in one place. You can go through your calendar and order printed photos, set up a slide show, and add friends and family to share your moments! There are also tons of articles to read that gives tips on caring for your baby and just parenting in general. I LOVE THIS APP!!!

You can enjoy Tinybeans Premium for FREE by clicking HERE!!!

Thanks for reading!!!

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Have a SUPER day!!!

Amy McCutcheon

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